


Healer's Heart

by devilinthedetails



Category: PIERCE Tamora - Works, Tortall - Tamora Pierce
Genre: Decisions, Disappointment, Duty, Family, Father and Son, Gen, Grief, Loss, references to death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-13
Updated: 2018-11-13
Packaged: 2019-08-23 00:16:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 819
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16608182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/devilinthedetails/pseuds/devilinthedetails
Summary: Baird is disappointed by his son's decision to train as a knight.





	Healer's Heart

Healer’s Heart

“Father.” Neal had started using that formal address rather than any form of endearment while attending university. He seemed to believe that it lent his argument an air of gravity, but as he stood on the carpet of Baird’s study, Baird thought that in his mourning robes—dark as the cowled Black God’s—he looked grave enough. “I’ve resolved to withdraw from university and enroll in page training.” 

“I remember you stood on that very spot”—Baird pointed a finger that still trembled with the loss of his sons to immortal monsters—“and argued your case for studying at the Royal University.” 

Neal’s chin had been raised for battle beneath snapping green eyes then just as they were now, but Baird had disarmed him midway through his speech by hugging his youngest son, whom he had never expected to be in a position to inherit his lands and titles, and declaring that he was proud of Neal—that Neal had made the right decision. Later, Neal had revealed that he had expected Baird to be disappointed in him and had been stunned when he wasn’t. 

“That was before.” Neal’s gaze was shadowed, and he couldn’t bring himself to finish the sentence—to bury his brothers again with his words. “Now I have to do my duty to my realm and my family, serving as a knight of Tortall.” 

“Do you believe that being a knight is the only path to serving the realm?” Baird arched an eyebrow. 

“A knight of Queenscove has served the realm for centuries.” Neal deftly dodged the question. 

Baird ached to respond that he had lost too many sons in service to Tortall already but that sounded too much like treason, so he answered at last, “You’re made to be a healer, not a knight, Neal.” 

“Because I have two thoughts to rub together and am not afraid to express them for the edification of others?” Neal’s nostrils flared. 

“No.” Baird sighed. His son’s sharp tongue would be a perpetual affront to Lord Wyldon, but Baird knew that Neal’s caustic comments were the hard exoskeleton he built to protect his soft insides—his healer’s heart. “Because you have a healer’s heart.” 

“I don’t have a healer’s heart,” Neal scoffed, but his eyes dropped to the carpet as if even he couldn’t deny the truth of who he was. 

“You can’t ignore what beats in your chest.” Baird squeezed his only remaining son’s shoulders, disappointed by the boy’s refusal to acknowledge his own fundamental identity, which felt like a rejection of who Baird was at his core and of the person Baird had tried to raise his youngest son to be. “You were born to be a healer, Neal.” 

“I can still be a healer.” Neal’s jaw clenched. “It’s possible to be a knight and a healer. Ask your friend Sir Alanna if you don’t believe me.” 

“Healing and killing are two of the most difficult things a person can do.” Baird spoke tartly because that was the only tone his stubborn boy listened to these days. “Discuss that with Sir Alanna before you decide to follow in her footsteps along the rough rode she walks.” 

“I understand that you’re angry, Father.” Neal’s chest was heaving with so much raw emotion that Baird feared for his health. The lad had ever been a bundle of nerves prone to dramatics and attacks of anxiety. 

“I’m not angry.” Baird gentled his voice, hoping to calm his son. “I’m just disappointed with your decision.” 

“I don’t want to disappoint you, the family, or the country.” Neal slumped, a sagging sail after the wind had fled from it. “Are you forbidding me from training as a knight?” 

“No.” Baird had learned long ago that it was wiser to allow Neal to arrive at the proper conclusion for himself rather than attempt to compel obedience from an eternally argumentative Neal. “I won’t forbid you from training as a knight because I trust you’ll make the right decision in the end.” 

“I’ll write a letter to Dean Harailt to formally withdraw from the university tomorrow, and another to Lord Wyldon announcing my intent to begin training as a page.” Neal nodded as if agreeing with himself after some internal debate. 

Baird thought that a notice of withdrawal was poor thanks to Harailt, who had been gracious enough to grant Neal a semester’s leave to grieve for his brothers and who had always been a patient mentor despite Neal’s impertinence, but aloud he merely stipulated, “Give me the letters to review before you send them so I can ensure they are sufficiently respectful. I don’t want you burning bridges with Dean Haralit or starting off on the wrong foot with Lord Wyldon.”

“Oh, you know me, Father.” Neal was sarcastic, but Baird preferred his boy direct his snideness on him instead of Lord Wyldon or Dean Haralit. “I’m always sufficiently respectful.”


End file.
